“In the soil of fear are planted the seeds of deception” [Mark Jenkins]
IVANN BIBI
Nouveau Front Politik
In 2016 polls and surveys aimed at predicting the outcome of the US Presidential elections proved to be highly flawed, and off the mark: most predicting a comfortable win for Hillary Clinton. One theory to explain these modeling errors is known as the “Trump Effect”, “….the so-called “shy Trump” effect. The idea is that Trump supporters took part in the surveys but were embarrassed to divulge their support for an unpopular candidate. If true, the “undecided” voters were really Trump voters all along; they just didn’t want to admit it to pollsters…”
Under the “Trump Effect” candidate Trump’s perceived fascist, and at times racist, anti-democratic rhetoric and behavior made people “shy” to admit that they were going to vote for him, thereby skewing the surveys results with reality. In short, people lied when surveyed.
Today we may see the exact same scenario playing out in political surveys in Mauritius: even more so as it is two-fold. On the one hand, people are “shy” to admit that they will vote (again) for the so-called “dinosaurs” or even for the former Prime Minister Navinchandra Ramgoolam; on the other hand, a systematically and deeply terrorized population, Lepep Morisien, are not only “shy” but SCARED to admit that they WILL NOT vote for the current MSM regime and its leader Pravind Kumar Jugnauth. Fear dictates this. They are frightened, and extremely weary, of the age-old practice in Mauritius known as “représailles,” a tactic that the current Machiavellian Government has now taken to new heights and to new extremes.
The examples of the “revenge” politics practiced by the MSM are many and the list is long, very very long. For the past seven years that the MSM has been in power these tactics range from massive scandals that have rocked the country such as the “BAI” and “Betamax” fiascos, but also to more seemingly mundane events: such as the investigation of civil servants who may have leaked corrupt and fraudulent activities at the Ministry of Health.
Who can forget the raiding of the Health Ministry’s offices and the seizing of computers in an effort to find the culprits of the leaks, instead of arresting the fraudsters of the alleged criminal activities themselves? In reality, events such as these are not mundane at all, and have a real impact on people’s lives and their psychology when it comes to their relationship with those who govern them. Worse, these types of events are innumerable, or business as usual, today in the Mauritius of the MSM. They permeate society, persecuting the population, rendering them paranoid, oppressed, and scared.
I witnessed this tragic and heartbreaking psychology, in an up-close and personal manner, during the 2017 by-election in Belle-Rose/Quatre-Bornes (#18), Mauritius. While campaigning door-to-door in the constituency, I would come across many voters who consistently explained to me that they would NOT be voting in the upcoming by-election, simply because the Government (the MSM) had no candidate aligned. When pressed as to why this mattered, the response was literally always the same: because since the MSM/Government had not aligned a candidate, it automatically meant that any voter who cast a vote did not vote for the Government/MSM, and that this could have future “repercussions” for the said voters and their families. I was shocked and heartbroken, as I was told more times than I care to recall: “Mo frer travay la polis” or “Mo tifi travay dan lopital” or “Mo kouzinn anseignant dan lekol” or “Mo bizin renouvle permit pou mo biznes.”
The People were, in my opinion, beyond oppressed: for me, this was tyranny.
Upon closer analysis and by way of all the many answers from voters as to why they were abstaining in the 2017 by-election, two things became very clear to me long ago and beyond the shadow of a doubt: that across the board, the Mauritian population was petrified of its Government; and, that Mauritius was not a true democracy, not even close.
Can you picture for one moment what the results on a similar survey about political parties and political leaders might look like in North Korea—for example, how do you think the North Korean population might answer to a survey question such as “Would you vote to replace Kim Jong-un?” Before you answer that question, first answer this: what do you think would happen to all those North Korean voters who answered “Yes, I would vote to replace Kim Jong-un” in a survey?
Most likely Kim Jong-un would bulldoze their houses and build a “tramway” where they used to live: all the while proclaiming to the Nation that it was in fact a “metro.” And none would dare say otherwise.
Whilst Mauritius is no North Korea (yet), the psychology of their respective populations is similar—especially when it comes to expressing any sort of anti-governmental sentiment, perceived or otherwise. Much like the “Trump Effect” witnessed in the US, in Mauritius it is the “représailles effect” that skews surveys drastically from reality. Hence, surveys that claim to reflect such statistics are in my opinion therefore evidently fundamentally flawed. Or as our Right Honorable Prime Minister might say “evidaman”…